NEWS
Highlights from CED’s Commencement Ceremony at the Greek Theatre
Jun 24, 2022
Congratulations to the graduating class of 2022. The College of Environmental Design had a lovely commencement ceremony to honor its graduating students at the historic Hearst Greek Theatre and invited back graduates who didn’t get an in-person graduation from the classes of 2020 and 2021. Family, friends, and peers filled the theatre and heard speeches by students Sierra Kirkpatrick, Rachel Durney, Elliott Kwon, and Nate Kauffman. The 2022 CED commencement speaker was Deanna Van Buren, former Rupp Prize recipient and co-founder of Designing Justice + Designing Spaces.
“It’s hard to imagine my college experience without the College of Environmental Design. My time at UC Berkeley has been defined by this small, lovely community I call home.” Sierra Kirkpatrick
“Our classes – our professors, even – do not have all the answers. Instead, the programs of our college demand that we look past facades and acknowledge complexity. They have taught us to ask “how will people inhabit the environments we are learning to shape and create?”, and in doing so give us the tools to continue into an ever changing future.” Rachel Durney
” Our years here have been an exercise in this: in trusting this college, its faculty, staff, and our peers, to teach, support, and guide us to where we are today. Have confidence that you will ask questions about systems and structures, and that you will look for answers from people with new and different perspectives. Know that you have made real connections with people who share your care for the experience of others. Today is a reminder that you, individually and collectively, are capable of the work and dedication these complex problems require. We’ve put our trust in you. Congratulations class of 2022!” Rachel Durney
“We are unafraid to be messy, to experiment, and to lay ourselves bare in our earnest seeking to engage in the questions and passions that drive us. We do not concern ourselves with propriety, the ‘right way to behave’ or the ‘right way to practice.’ No one has the time for ‘egos.’ As many have said before me and will continue to proclaim in the generations ahead: after all, this is Berkeley. That in this motley crew of eccentric thinkers undergoing a process which often appears unorthodox, nonlinear, and even chaotic, we trust to unlock the inner creative potentials within us to confront the unprecedented, seemingly intractable problems of our time.” Elliott Kwon
“You are moving on from the academy today into a world riven by political divides and polarization, in which liberal democracy is under threat of authoritarianism and intolerance. And yet, this is a time in which your ability to organize and act, facilitated by the sheer connectedness of the digital age, is unprecedented.” Nate Kauffman
“You face a world where inequality and injustice are rife and on the rise in many places. And yet, your capacity to access and share stories of the struggles common to so many scattered across the entire globe, would have been unimaginable two generations ago.” Nate Kauffman
“In your time at Berkeley, you have come to know that our planet is in deep peril; that the health of this biosphere is under dire threat. And yet, you also sense that within your generation, this problem is seen with crystal clear eyes: as an inescapable fact, not some manufactured controversy.” Nate Kauffman